Fire Within chapter 12

fixing a lightbulb

Fire Within: Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross and the Gospel on Prayer (Fr. Thomas Dubay, S.M.)

https://ignatius.com/fire-within-fwp/

(If you are catching up: chapter 1, chapter 2, chapter 3, chapter 4, chapter 5, chapter 6, chapter 7, chapter 8, chapter 9, chapter 10, chapter 11)

Chapter 12 “Miscellaneous Matters”

Lord, I have already been on two trips this summer — one for work and one which was a pilgrimage — and maybe the third will be the one in which I rest... it is true that You did provide a day of rest after the second one and I am not complaining — but my life at the moment does not feel well-ordered or (therefore) sustainable... well, You will sort that out, and I will try to cooperate. You will also have to tell me what I actually need to do before I go... this is probably a different list than I am thinking of.

This is a chapter of unrelated things thrown together in a sequence and this is how I feel right now: like I have not had time to process anything that has happened in June and July (what would this processing even entail? I think it would entail several hours writing in a journal at adoration [not for general consumption but rather because this is how I process events] — and this is what I have not done. I have at least taken time for silent prayer but that is something different, being silent, while writing is chatter at a conscious level. It is 7:30am [daily Mass on Saturday is at 8am] and I am going to write, not about June and July, but at least about this chapter, and find a half hour of “I am shutting up now” prayer some other time today (could it be at adoration?) [but in fact it was in a long slow confession line later that morning.] (You will provide what You think is best and not what i do.)

The first page [in the chapter] just explains why this is a hodgepodge.

The next section [is] “The Humanity of Christ and Advanced Prayer”: should I pretend that I can speak coherently about advanced prayer? This section is 3 pages on how we ought still to love Your sacred humanity, Lord, ... one does not advance by rooting out all thoughts from the head [here I am thinking of Buddhists] and all feelings from the heart; if You are pleased that we should at times think very little or not be aware of thinking at all, that is Your affair and our task is not to rebel if You should do this (this is a very hard task, or, a very easy one, because it is a resignation of one’s will to events beyond one’s control). A person is not making great effort to reason or to visualize (as in Ignatian prayer) in order to move the heart to love; it would generally involve a simple “glance”, a confused and obscure remembrance of what You in Your passion and death have done for me. This is very necessary to have access to because on this (and the remembrance of past things; one’s exodus) is built trust in You, which is absolutely vital as the darkness closes in. [Typing up this paragraph, I don’t know that I really agree now with what I was writing then. Let’s not romanticize hard times and trials. I’ll just type without thinking about it; someone is yelling at me from another room, having a meltdown, thus I’m not in the mood for anything.] You died for me (perhaps I look at a crucifix as an aid and support for this statement) and how can I not trust You; then perhaps (not now) I would weep with contrition (which is Your gift also) for the many times (a confused + jumbled heap appearing to encompass one’s entire life) I have not trusted You as I should. (7:46 am) I don’t have more to say.

“Empty” Prayer - three pages on this; when I read of aridity I always think “well, I never experience this” (not true but a constant impression) ... I think it is only that 1. ! don’t recall feelings not present now, or 2. I remember the dramatic ones only [and of course only the fact of them]: overwhelming love and joy, or profound misery and interior agony. At a theme park (Kennywood) plenty of time is spent in line but it is the “thrills” that we recall, the exciting ones and the nauseating or “when will it end — how long O Lord?” ones. [Yes, how long O Lord indeed.] Investors say “stay the course” and ignore the stock market; “buy and hold” and do not change your behavior based on bear or bull markets; prayer is “like” (it’s totally unlike but bear with me) dollar cost averaging — buy a little of heaven daily whether it seems like a good idea or a poor investment. Don’t become a glutton in times of consolation (The stock is going up! buy! — at the peak) or a coward in times of desolation (sell! sell! watch TV, doomscroll, eat ice cream, anything but pray) — or, invest a little more in the dip just to counter one’s own will + accept God’s will. (Went to daily Mass 8 am)

(At adoration, 11:33pm, subbing for 11pm hour) “Distractions” — two pages on this — my problem, Lord, is that I entertain them!! Not that I entertain them during silent prayer [not to the same degree] but when praying the office -- as bad as the fellow I heard about in grad school who (the next adorer has come in now) finally tied himself to his chair with his belt in order to work on his thesis. (I think looping it through the back loop on his pants, and buckling it to the chair back.) — this is a form of acedia, the getting up and leaving one’s cell (not that I have a cell per se). What I ought to do is to reject these thoughts as they arise: no, I will not get up to do this brief task that I just remembered [followed halfway through by ten other tasks, cf. this sitcom clip

]; I will trust You to remind me later if it is truly important... [versus] to pray Office of Readings while also making pancake batter... I probably ought not to live that way. (11:41pm) O Lord! I know that You permit distraction so that I can offer You “what I have” (with greater challenge or with less pride) — give me grace to remain at prayer and not leave it for every little thing; it is one thing if a child calls for me, another thing if I get up to write something on the grocery list; this is not urgent.

“Tensions Between Prayer and Work” — 2 or 3 pages. This is a good section and should be read with attention. I want to copy out one sentence in particular toward the end: Fr. Dubay writes, paraphrasing St. Teresa, “everyone who wishes to reach the transforming union must give up unnecessary cares and occupations” ([my editorial comment] “Μάρθα Μάρθα...”) St. Teresa qualifies it “as far as his state of life permits”. She was sometimes advising laypeople such as her relatives. — What then, Lord, are the necessary and what are the “unnecessary affairs and business”? I am [but here I was complaining about my station in life in detail, which is silly, so let’s leave that out.]

If You don’t tell me, it’s impossible for me to see it truly. You told Martha only one thing is necessary and then characteristically [I have just been listening to Sunday School] You did not tell her what it was! but today (in these, the end times which we have been in since Pentecost, a couple of millennia) I would suppose that it is what You keep telling me:

• listen to the prompting of the Holy Spirit

• be docile to it [the prompting]

• [in order] to be able to listen, remain recollected

I am still terrible at this. (12:02 am Sunday)

(Sun - 11 am - prayed OR in the basement of the church [because I would be less distracted there than in my living room]) 11:27am “Demonic Influences” — a page to say that it’s possible to make too much or too little of these. ...The enemy wants to rule us through fear and anxiety and we ought not to let these separate us from the desire to be conformed to Christ. (11:30: pray MP) — in particular he desires to disrupt, prevent, or forestall moments of contemplative prayer in which the soul increasingly progresses toward union w/ God. [Here I was thinking about Psalm 50: sacrificing animals without conversion of heart, or praying the breviary without any attention] Mouthing empty words on our own terms + our own schedule + for our own agenda, w/o giving God our hearts... is okay [from the enemy’s perspective]. It is a risk still since You, O Lord, hear + answer prayer, and the enemy would prefer us not to pray at all — but until then, this will do.

“Aspiring to Advanced Contemplation” — a page on trusting that God — that You, Lord, having given a desire, will give also its attainment, if we stay the course. “he who puts his hand to the plow and looks back” ought to petition You for purity (that is single-mindedness) of heart. This, you will grant (as I heard in a homily this week. [actually yesterday evening]

“The Possibility of Mediocrity and Regression”, O Lord, preserve me from it. Do I begin + end every period of prayer w/ self-examination? Assuredly I do not... evidently I should? Of what, Lord, is this to consist? If You don’t tell me (by one means or another — You prefer humble [i.e. ordinary] ones) then I will not know. I ought perhaps (begging for light to see things Your way) to cast my mind back over the hours of the day in a single glance and to repent of whatever stands out in them, e.g. I woke at nine but put off something that I ought to have done on rising until 10:30am, and why? because I did not trust You; give me, then a greater trust of You, Lord... “lax people follow their feelings” not principles; the world, not the Gospel; [paraphrasing from this section] in short the old man is piloting the boat, the one who might as well be an animal; Shall I eat a cookie? Foolish to deny myself a simple pleasure at the moment I desire it! If I pause to think “what would God desire of me right now?’ it is only to put words in Your mouth: to defend my practice of indulging my senses w/ material comfort. But far more likely I do not think of God at all ... I cannot hide from you, Lord, but I can refuse to look at You, refuse to accept the clearly written reminders in Scripture that You care about the smallest detail of our lives, that every tear of ours is numbered, that what is hidden will be revealed, that the just will be rewarded... that You, Lord, were content with one tunic [thinking of Luke 3:11] and whatever food You were offered — bread, fish — what a very strange life You led: born into obscurity — obedient to law — laboring as a common artisan,not the white-collar or ruling class... intent on Your Father’s will where we would be intent on where our next meal is coming from [thinking of John 4:34].

“On Keeping a Prayer Journal” — ! I don’t know precisely what kind of practice is meant here. What were these people doing? Whatever it was, let’s not do it. God forbid, Lord, that I should be distracted in prayer by wanting to write something down when I ought to be paying attention to You, and yet sometimes I am. If it is an important idea, would You not remind me of it again when the time for prayer is over? and yet I don’t trust You to do this, which is ridiculous. A person ought not to do whatever she is describing but there is a different kind that St. Ignatius of Loyola did when discerning a decision, and praying about it over a number of days and recording a summary of his feelings (peace / consolation / tears ... he cried a lot which I think astonishes modern man). In general though what happens in prayer “happens in Vegas and stays in Vegas” in the sense that the effect isn’t what we felt and that [feeling] is the least important thing about it, so just forget about it; if it would be helpful to record one’s mood as a reinforcement (looking back) that desolation and consolation both feel like they will be perduring and both are not then go ahead but don’t make yourself crazy over it. [e.g. “Monday: dry. Tuesday: consolation. Wednesday: forgot to write anything.”]

“Sexual Feelings at Prayer” — we are not angels, and emotions have a physical aspect.

“Delight in Prayer” — we ought not to be attached to it. This and the two preceding sections are thematically related: if we experience what she is quoted as saying here, it is [paraphrasing] indescribable and unforgettable and impossible to “journal” and anything short of that is pointless to “journal”, ergo don’t journal at all; secondly, it is a greater joy and delight than anything physical (we might dismiss what a nun says, and in that case I would look up what a repentant sinner such as St. Augustine says, and take him at his word). The world pities people who do not have sex, as a child pities someone who does not eat Hershey’s chocolate bars, thinking this to be the greatest possible human delight; the world is crazy. When the joy overflows into the body, goodness knows what it will feel like (“then your bones will flourish like the grass” [we could also choose from nursing infant imagery]), the important thing is that that’s not important: one ought not to avoid prayer fearing what may happen, nor to go to prayer desiring any sort of feeling. We ought to be willing to accept from Your hand either what pleases or what displeases the natural man: delight on the one hand or a hard look at “what I am (vs. what God is)” on the other. (12:50pm).

But, Lord, whenever I start writing “we” rather than I, or “God” rather than You, I have generally gone off the rails. Do I avoid prayer because of what I think I will or won’t “Get out of it” compared to doing something else? absolutely; this is a real struggle and I ought to resolve to behave in a radically different way — rather than essentially the same as a child who says “I’m not hungry” when asked to come to lunch while in the middle of doing something else — playing a computer game, or watching a video. 1. you ought to be hungry! 2. if you’re not, you ought to eat at mealtimes until your appetite recovers! What’s the alternative, after all? if we don’t eat, eventually we die. Here I am, back to “we”!